Sunday with a Good Book…...

I've always loved to read - at least for as long as I can remember. The Park Ridge Library was a favorite haunt when I was growing up. School libraries too. Books made perfect gifts for birthday or Christmas. I loved getting lost in a book.

Books were friends when none of mine were around. Books provided escape when I needed to pretend to be elsewhere for awhile. Books offered comfort when I needed it.

I've read so many good books over the years that I can't even begin to count them. I wish, now, that I'd kept some kind of list with titles, authors and a few comments. But never mind - too late to start now. I've been known to re-read books (and not on purpose) going along, chapter after chapter, with an itch that says "this seems very familiar but I just can't quite remember what happens"…..so I continue on to the end.

We stopped for a quick visit with my sister and her husband on our way back from Indiana last week. (Stopping outside Chicago saves us from having to "push through" that last stretch where muscles are cramping and we just want OUT OF THE CAR. Plus it's always nice to spend time together.)

Before we left on Thursday morning Susan gave me a book. I finished it while sitting out in the yard this afternoon. I closed the cover with a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes. I love when a book does that to me. When the characters pull you in….when the story won't let you go. When you just have to keep reading even though your "to-do-list" is waiting. When sentences or paragraphs make enough of an impression that you just have to re-read them.

I am going to pass this book on to a special friend - I think she will have a similar reaction…..and then she can pass it along to someone else.

Thank you Susan….I never would have discovered The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin without you. One reviewer's comment is as follows: "A wonderful, moving, endearing story of redemption and transformation that will sing in your heart for a very, very long time." I know its notes will sing in mine.

The novel takes place in a small bookstore on a small island off the coast of New England. The store's motto is "No Man is An Island; Every Book is A World".

I loved this world.